ENT docs help Pak boy take natural breath

Chennai, Oct 6 (UNI) A three-year-old Pakistani boy breathed through his nose for the first time in his life, thanks to a complex surgery by a team of ENT specialists in the city.

Hassan, the only child of Kamal and Sohail Ahmad Khah -- a primary school Maths teacher in Karachi, had a condition called 'Congenital Subglottic Stenosis,' which means narrowing of the windpipe just below the vocal cords (larynx).

Since the age of three months, he had been breathing through a tracheostomy tube attached to his neck as he had difficulty in breathing through nose.

As no medical centre in Pakistan could correct the child's problem, the distressed couple were advised by a senior doctor to contact Indian medical institutions as they were technologically advanced.

Coming to know about Madras ENT Research Foundation (MERF) on internet, the couple immediately contacted the hospital and flew down to the city.

A team of doctors at the MERF performed the surgery which involved transposing a piece of his rib cartilage to widen the windpipe and placement of a stent in his larynx, MERF Chairman Dr Mohan Kameswaran told mediapersons here today.

The surgery, which lasted for neary three hours, was performed on August 29, 2006.

Four weeks later, the stent was removed and KTP/532 laser, one of the most sophisticated lasers in the world for airway surgery, was used to clear away residual granulation, he said.

As Hassan made a rapid recovery, the tracheostomy tube was removed after a month and the boy was now undergoing voice therapy to speak, which he had never done in his life.

Thanking the Indian doctors for making her son to breath through the nose, Kamal said the boy celebrated his third birthday in the hospital on September 27 without a tube in his neck - a best ever birthday gift he could have.

Dr Kameswaran said airway problems were amongst the most difficult ENT problems affecting children and a very few medical centers in the world undertake surgeries for correction of pediatric airway problems. The surgery costs between Rs 65,000 and Rs 70,000.

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